They’d spent a whole day testing their effects, the attraction and repulsion. Syd had always thought of magnetic force as a pull, but she’d been shocked to discover the strength of their push. Even a small flat disc could exert so much force against another.

She felt that same repulsion now, as her fingers hovered over her sister’s bones.

Sydney tried to will her hands down as something inside her heart pushed back.

Why couldn’t she do it?

Sydney had to bring Serena back.

She was her sister.

Family isn’t always blood.

June had said that—June, who’d never betrayed Sydney. June, who’d protected Victor. But she wasn’t Serena.

And if EON was chasing them now, Serena could help. Serena could do anything. Could make other people do anything.

It was a terrifying power to start with—but how bad would it be if Serena came back wrong? What would that power look like when it was fractured, broken?

For so long, Sydney had assumed she was afraid of failing. Afraid that she’d slip, lose the threads, and with that, her only chance at

reviving Serena.

But the longer she stared at her sister’s bones, the more Sydney realized—she was just as scared of succeeding.

Why had she waited so long? Was it really because she thought it had to happen here? That the connection would be strongest back where it had first been broken?

Or—was it because it gave her an excuse to wait?

Because Sydney was afraid to see her sister again.

Because Sydney wasn’t ready to face Serena.

Because Sydney wasn’t sure she should bring her sister back, even if she could.

Tears blurred her vision.

She realized, suddenly, that in all her nightmares, Serena had never once saved her. She was there, on the banks of the frozen river, waiting, watching as Eli stalked Syd across the ice. As he wrestled her to the frozen ground. As he wrapped his hands around Syd’s throat.

Serena hadn’t pulled the trigger on Sydney that night.

But she hadn’t stopped Eli from shooting her either.

Sydney missed her sister.

But she missed the version of Serena who had loved and protected Sydney, made her younger sister feel safe, and seen. And that Serena had died in ice, not fire.

Sydney’s fingers finally came to rest against Serena’s bones. But she didn’t reach beyond them, didn’t search for the lingering thread. She simply folded them up inside the strip of cloth, and put them back in the red metal tin.

Her legs were shaking as she pushed herself up to her feet.